


Deserted

by supernovainparadise



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Also we love and respect Elle Greenaway in this fucking house, Angst, Anyway it's in the first chapter, At least 6?, Bisexual Spencer Reid, Drug Abuse, Drug Addiction, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Friends With Benefits, HEAVY FUCKING ANGST, Hook-Up, Hotch is just under fourty, Hurt Aaron Hotchner, Hurt Hotch hours!, Hurt Spencer Reid, It's hurt Spencer hours!, Just "hey wanna have sex? I'm bored" "sure", Like the first scene is a sex scene, M/M, Motorcycles, Reid is thirty, Running away from your problems instead of fucking dealing with them, Season unclear, That's all Spencer's and Elle's relationship is here, and also
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 08:27:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29186268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/supernovainparadise/pseuds/supernovainparadise
Summary: After ruining his four-year clean streak to save the life of someone he cares about, Spencer takes off from the BAU, leaving nothing but a brief note of apology on his superior's desk. He winds up deep in the Mojave desert, with nothing more than his motorcycle, a change or two of clothes, a couple of bottles of drug-store heroin, and a fuck ton of regret.And Aaron Hotchner will be damned if he lets this be the end of one of his closest friends.
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/Spencer Reid, Derek Morgan & Spencer Reid, Elle Greenaway/Spencer Reid, Emily Prentiss & Spencer Reid, Jason Gideon & Spencer Reid, Penelope Garcia & Spencer Reid
Comments: 3
Kudos: 46





	1. Saddle Up

Spencer's breath hitches tight in his throat as his fingers grip down a little tighter on her hips. He hears her let out a breathy laugh above them, and he opens his eyes, shooting her a lazy smirk. Elle grins back in response, resting her hands on his chest as she lifts up off him again, before sliding back down, and-

" _Oh damn_ ," Spencer mutters, fingers digging in just enough to bruise.

Elle leans down and connects her lips with his in a hard, heavy kiss. Spencer's hips jerk up, almost involuntarily, and Elle gasps into his mouth before biting down on his lip, hard enough to hurt but not hard enough to break the skin.

"Mm, just one more thing you're good at, _Dr. Reid..._ " Elle whispers between moans, and it's Spencer's turn to chuckle, low and deep in the back of his throat.

"There's a lot of things I'm good at," Spencer responds, before reaching up and grabbing her by the hips, then flipping her onto her back. Elle cries out in surprise but quickly regains her footing, grinning up at Spencer as her hair fans out on the pillow behind her.

"Why don't you show me?"

Spencer Reid is more than happy to oblige, and ten minutes later they're both on their backs, breathing hard, spent and satisfied. The motel room smells of sex, and the sensation of pleasure running through Spencer's body has caused the familiar cravings to subside, at least for the moment. Spencer is unsurprised when Elle rolls herself on top of him, skin once again pressed against skin, and he opens one eye and sighs.

"Elle, I hate to say it, but I think I'm out of energy."

"I figured, given that you've been silent for ten whole minutes," she teases, reaching up and twisting one of his curls around her finger. "I just wanted to cuddle." Spencer smiles and obliges her, wrapping his arms tight around her waist as she rests her head under his chin and runs her hand through his hair. All is quiet for a moment longer before Elle asks, "why'd we never think of having sex before?"

Spencer laughs out loud. "because back when you were in the BAU I was a 24-year-old loser?"

Elle presses a kiss under his jaw and says, "you were more a nerd than a loser. I always thought you were cool."

"Aww..." Spencer mutters sleepily.

Elle laughs again and snuggles into his chest again.

The morning after is, to Spencer's surprise, not at all awkward. The morning sex is brief and mostly consists of Spencer going down on Elle before they both hop in the shower. They manage to go nearly twenty minutes before Elle asks him, "what are you doing here, anyway?"

Spencer hesitates, glancing up from where he's tugging on his boots to look at Elle as she fixes her hair in the bathroom mirror. "I guess I'm taking a leave. Things have been... complicated."

"I understand that perfectly," Elle mutters, and Spencer huffs. She turns to face him and frowns. "Don't believe me? C'mon Reid, I was a profiler once." Spencer doesn't meet her eyes and focuses on tying his boots, not looking up till the bed dips beside him. "you're my friend, Spence. I know when somethings wrong. Talk to me."

Spencer thinks about it, for a long moment, then sighs and says, "it began with a case."


	2. Burning Daylight

_"It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life." -Joseph Campbell_

Spencer pulls hard at the binds around his unconscious superior, his heart jack-rabbiting in his chest as he desperately attempts to rip away the bindings. The unsub merely laughs, the sound grating in his ears, and he has to resist the urge to cry out in frustration. Spencer whips around to glare at the unsub, who merely cocks her head and grins at him. "It's so sweet when you know they'll ultimately fail," she coos, and Spencer desperately wishes he had his gun on him.

"Let him go," he chokes, and the unsub merely laughs.

"Not until you do what I asked." She says, sickly sweet, gesturing to the needle sitting on the table.

Spencer can feel himself panicking, feel his chest constricting and adrenaline building in his veins. He knows if he just plays it out, if he buys for time, that the others will get there. Hotch and he will make it out, and he'll stay clean, and this sick bitch will end up behind bars for the rest of her miserable life. And yet he knows he could have prevented this. He knew that this unsub was a classic sadist, that she kidnapped someone to draw in a second victim, that she thrived off of profiling someone and learning what their worst fear is. Digging into records that should be sealed, going out of her way to devise special torture, before ultimately killing them both.

 _"You will suffer the same way I did..."_ She had hissed before putting the rag to his face.

He stares at the needle, and those traitorous thoughts come sneaking back in. _It'll be easier to endure if you're high... Is Aaron worth less than your sobriety? How cold... You want to, oh God you want to... Just one dose... It's just one dose... It'll feel so good..._

Aaron groans above him, and Spencer's head shoots up, hardly daring to believe it... Then Aaron's head slumps again, and when Spencer checks his pulse it's weaker than before.

"Tik-tok, doctor..." the unsub whispers, and Spencer looks up at the tiny window, the last rays of day filtering through it, and something in him breaks.

"Okay..." he sobs, and crawls over to the table, snatching the needle. "I'll do it. But promise me... Promise me you'll let him go. Promise me he lives."

The unsub cocks her head again, and looks at Aaron. "I promise you I will not do any more harm. If he survives what he's already faced, well... Who can say?"

And that's good enough. That has to be good enough. Spencer knows these types of people well enough to know that he won't get better, so he rolls up his sleeve, rips off his tie, ties it tight around his arm, and shoves the needle into his veins.

The door flies open just as the sweet sensation takes hold of him, but he does not miss the look of horror on Morgan's face as he slips away.

* * *

"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry-"

"Kiddo, it's okay, I promise-"

"I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry-"

"Reid, any of us would've done the same thing in your place-"

"I'm so sorry I'm so sorry I'm so sorry-"

"Spence... It's okay-"

"I'msosorryi'msosorryi'msosorry-"

Unlike the others, Garcia says nothing, merely sits on the bed and wraps Spencer up into her arms. No one's all that surprised when the agent bursts into full-on tears, sobbing hysterically into Penelope's shoulder.

Rossi lets out a shaky sigh, JJ reaches up to wipe tears away from her face, Morgan sets a gentle hand on Spencer's shoulder, and Emily sits beside them both, rubbing gentle circles into Spencer's shoulder. It's at least thirty minutes before the hysterics die away, leaving empty hiccups in their place.

"We'll figure this out one step at a time," Emily ensures him.

But Spencer looks at them, and all he can see are the looks of horror and disgust and betrayal on their faces when they broke down that door. All he can hear is Morgan screaming, "Reid _don't_!" and the unsub's high, cold laugh. And in the back of his mind, a hoarse and horrified whisper, "what did he just do?", a whisper that he knows somewhere deep in his being came from Hotch. His eyes catch on his jacket, hanging off the back of a nearby chair, one of the pockets weighed down by a token that he no longer deserves.

Emily's hand is still on his shoulder. Spencer shrugs it off, and lays down, rolling over to face the wall instead of his family, guilt and anger and the edge of his cravings swirling around in his stomach in one awful, painful, horrible mess.


	3. Chapter 3

Spencer knew he shouldn't have made that call. He knew he shouldn't have met with his dealer, knew he shouldn't have bought the heroin from him, knew he shouldn't have shot up fully clothed in his bathtub in his apartment. He knew all of this, and yet when he woke up in the tub the next morning, it hit him that he had anyway. He ran a hand through his hair and glanced down at the new track mark in his forearm and the syringe he'd shattered laying in pieces on the bathroom tiles. A headache was already building behind his skull, and nausea began to stir deep within his stomach. He forced himself up and out of the tub, grabbing his phone off the edge of the sink to check the time; 9:15.

Which meant he was already 15 minutes late for work. As if the withdrawal he was facing wasn't bad enough, now he'd get yelled at by Hotch for a solid fifteen minutes, which somehow made his day even worse. Somehow, though, he pushed past the temptation to call in sick, straightened the clothes he was already wearing, and headed for the Metro, praying that he didn't look as sick as he felt. He made it to Quantico at 10 o'clock, shoving his way past Derek and the odd look he was getting, and resisting the urge to kick in a cabinet when he saw there was no coffee left in the pot. Instead, desperately trying to ignore the shaking in his hands, he started another pot, not noticing Morgan hovering in the entryway until he spoke;

"you okay, Reid?"

Spencer stiffened and choked out, "fine."

"Because after what you and Hotch went through, it's okay not to be. And it's not like you to be this late," Derek's tone was gentle, but Spencer still felt irritation rip through him.

"I said I'm _fine_ , Morgan!" he snapped, before pouring himself a cup of coffee and storming past him and back into the bullpen.

He didn't miss Emily's raised eyebrow or the way Seaver jumped when he slammed his coffee cup down a little too hard, but simply ignored both of them, turning on his computer and sipping at his coffee, trying desperately to ignore the migraine coming on and the hallucinations in the corners of his eyes that it typically brought with it. He was trying to work, to get paperwork done, but his own irritation at background noises, at the shitty cup of coffee, at the sound of his own typing, that he didn't even notice that Hotch was behind him till he set a hand on his shoulder.

Reid jumped about a mile, turning around to scowl at whoever had just touched him, only to see his concerned boss just behind him.

"Are you alright, Spencer?" Hotch asked, voice surprisingly soft.

"I'm-" did he lie again? Look Hotch in the eye and say he was fine when he wasn't fine. When he was falling back into a dark pit he'd desperately tried to pull himself out of, with what felt like the world closing in on him? He saw the clear emotion on Aaron's face, and he knew that if he lied he wouldn't believe him. And yet... "I'm okay."

One look at Aaron's face told him that the older man didn't believe him. And yet... Hotch sighed and turned away, not wanting to press the issue, and Spencer couldn't tell if he was grateful, or if he wanted to grab Hotch by the wrist and drag him back, begging him to find some way to help him.

Instead, he just let him walk away.

The day continued much of the same way, with Spener trying not to lose his temper over minor inconveniences, and failing several times, and watching as the team, people he'd grown to view as family, turned away from him again. Ignored him, shut him down, no one else bothered to say anything in fear of getting snapped at.

And so on the week went. By the end of it, Spencer was riding the tail end of a continuous high, and though he was working faster than he had in his life, he was pretty much just a silent fixture of the office. When he reached the end of that high, and everything began to crash around him again, he looked around at the office and thought _I can't take this anymore_. 

He left a brief note on Hotch's desk saying that he was going away for a bit, figuring that he'd probably just be fired, subleased his apartment to an old friend looking to live in the city, packed what he could fit on the motorcycle he barely used, and took off that same night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end is crap, I know, leave me alone.


End file.
